Revisiting the Internet Routers’ Buffers Sizing Problem
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.56313/jictas.v4i2.457Keywords:
Bandwidth-Delay Product Formula, Small-Buffers’ Rule, Network-Topology, Traffic Pipes, Minimum Nodal Buffer CapacityAbstract
The problem of appropriately sizing routers’ buffers has been a research issue which has elicited considerable interests for more than 30 years now. The question that has been so much debated is: How large should these buffers be? Three main buffers’ sizing rules exist in the literature, which are: Bandwidth-Delay Product (BDP), small-buffers’ and the tiny-buffers’ rules. But researchers are largely agreed that, the BDP formula specifies unrealistically large buffers; while the generic utility of the small and tiny buffers’ formulas have been questioned by most researchers. Some researchers have even opined that, deriving a single universal formula for dimensioning the buffers may not be possible: But, the congestion problem of data networks has largely been linked to inappropriately sized buffers. The main objective of this paper is to report the application, in the context of Internetworking Protocol (IP) networks, of a novel formula that was derived in a previously published paper; which can be used to appropriately specify these buffers. Additionally, we argue that, the formula is indeed a unique solution of the buffers’ sizing problem. The justification for this position is premised on the fact that, the formula may specify what we refer to as very-tiny buffers’, in addition to specifying literature’s tiny buffers’ capacities - a clear validation of the widely-held view that, the BDP formula specifies unrealistically large buffers. The reported formula however, has a huge advantage over literature’s tiny and small buffers’ formulas; as, it is ‘application-generic’, unlike literature’s tiny and small buffers’ formulas.
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